
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: FRIDAY, November 4, 1994                   TAG: 9411040110
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL                    PAGE: A-1   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: MADISON, WIS.                                LENGTH: Medium

BIG STEP TAKEN TOWARD NEW GENE THERAPY

Scientists working with monkeys have taken a crucial step toward a new kind of gene therapy in which tissue such as bone and blood could one day be grown in the laboratory and used to cure diseases in humans.

The researchers isolated for the first time embryonic monkey cells known as stem cells.

In two to four years, the cells could lead to the creation of genetically altered monkeys with illnesses that mimic human diseases such as AIDS and multiple sclerosis. That could advance the study of those diseases.

In the longer term, scientists may be able to isolate stem cells in humans and grow those cells in the laboratory as replacements for diseased tissue. Similar work has been done in mice for a decade.

Barbara Knowles, a geneticist at the Jackson Laboratory in Bar Harbor, Maine, called such a therapy a ``genetic Band-aid.''

However, such uses could raise difficult ethical questions from animal rights groups that object to genetic manipulation of animals, and from those who question who should make decisions about genetically altering human beings.

James Thomson and John Hearn of the University of Wisconsin primate center isolated stem cells from rhesus monkeys and marmosets, Hearn said Thursday. The government-supported center has applied for a patent on the isolating technique.

The critical feature of the cells is that they are parent cells of all tissue in the body and can be induced to grow into different kinds of tissue, Hearn said.

Researchers must closely study the characteristics of the cells before they can attempt to genetically alter them to produce monkeys with AIDS, MS, Lou Gehrig's disease and other mutations, he said.

The production of the first so-called transgenic monkeys is at least two to four years away, said Richard Dukelow of the National Institutes of Health, who directs the government primate centers.

``The possibility of transgenic work in primates would be tremendous,'' said Jeffrey Roberts, assistant director of the primate center at the University of California at Davis.

One use could be the study of the animals' immune system responses, which is important in the development of vaccines.

Some human diseases, such as cystic fibrosis, can be produced in mice, but because the physiology of mice is so different, the mice don't come down with the same symptoms as humans.

A National Institutes of Health panel formed to consider the ethics of human gene therapy said recently that experiments with human stem cells should be permitted. The panel deemed some other areas of human genetic research unethical.

by CNB